80% opinion, 15% analysis, 5% insight…All cricket

Test cricket

Saturday, March 29th 2009: 267 runs behind. Nine second innings wickets in hand. Six sessions left to play.

They can’t hit their way out of this. A bunch of inside edges to the boundary won’t save the game. Nor will a few stolen byes. The best bowlers won’t be taken off after bite-sized spells to let lesser bowlers on. The bowlers won’t be hampered by a slippery ball from dew in the outfield.

The pitch doesn’t even matter. It’s the situation they’re playing. It’s grinding bloody-minded toughness, to not give away anything to the bowlers, to ensure that each wicket is earned. One or two batsmen playing cameos will not do it. It’ll take all the remaining ten batsmen, playing out of their skins…to just draw the game.

Ron, that’s true, he’s currently in the form of his life in all the formats. Had a quick look at your site cricketanalysis.com and had it not been a monday morning, I’d be spending the rest of my day on it. Very interesting use of statistical modeling. Cheers!